The Door We Never Opened
by latetothpartyhp
Summary: Four years after his bachelor party, Clark is still pulling skeletons out of his closet. Sequel to Eradication, The Lens Through Which We Look and The Secret Parts of Fortune, none of which need to be read in order to understand this story.
1. Chapter 1

__Author's Note: Season 11? What Season 11? This story takes place after Clark becomes Superman but before the "seven years later". It assumes that Lex was first elected president in 2014 and the 2018 headline was announcing his decision to run again.

_What might have been and what has been_

_Point to one end, which is always present._

_Footfalls echo in the memory _

_Down the passage which we did not take._

_Towards the door we never opened_

_Into the rose-garden. My words echo_

_Thus, in your mind._

_But to what purpose_

_Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves_

_I do not know._

_I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where_

_And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time._

_Burnt Norton_, T. S. Eliot

To his surprise, Lois took to the boy. His memories of her did not indicate an affinity for children, nor they for her, but apparently that had been due to a lack of shared genetic material. The boy adored her as much as she adored him, and he found himself frequently – and discreetly - speeding out in front of the boy's way as he ignored Clark and barreled forward to greet his "aunt" when they came to visit him.

The boy also stayed with them often. He was not entirely sure how this happened. It wasn't as if his parents needed the child-care. He suspected a combination of pleading, bribery, and manipulation on Lois' part. Perhaps there was some begging on the boy's part, too. Certainly no other baby-sitter could be as simpatico as Lois. They shared the same tastes in food ("Seriously, a little raw cookie dough never hurt anyone, Clark. If anything his immune system needs more exposure to this stuff. It's never going to develop if they keep feeding him all that organic crap."), in martial arts ("Yes, I know he's only two, but real Jedi's begin their training when they're not much older."), and expediency ("They're putting way too much pressure on him with this potty-training business. He needs to figure it out at his own pace. If he wants to take off his clothes, strap on a diaper, and do his business, I say let him do it.") For his part Clark banned projectile-weapon toys from the house and let Lois answer the "So how'd it go?" questions at pick-up time.

One of the few real difficulties in taking care care of the boy was that while he stayed with him Clark couldn't patrol. The boy was an endless source of questions and "What's that?", "Why?" and "Where Uncle Clark?" were his three favorites. Despite his clear preference for Lois, the boy nevertheless always wanted Clark around: to answer his questions, including the ones about where Clark had been; to make them waffles in the mornings when he stayed overnight; and to be the bad guy when he and Lois battled evil (Lois, of course, found that to be no end of hilarious). The answers and the waffles weren't difficult, but the physical play was hard. The boy was in constant motion, even when he wasn't pretending to be the Green Arrow or Impulse (Lois always insisted that she got to be Superman), and it was difficult to predict his movements.

In addition, the boy was very small. That was problematic. Although his parents always insisted the boy was at a healthy size for his age, he'd always been small. He'd come early, at 32 weeks and was only four pounds, 10 ounces, just 2100 grams, when he first saw day. He'd spent the first month of his life in the NICU and the first time Clark had held him had been through the openings of his incubator, cradling the boy's head in one hand and his bent legs to his chest in the other. The nurse kept encouraging him to use a "firm touch". "Pretend your hands are the walls of his mother's uterus", she'd said, having no idea, of course, exactly how firm his touch could be.

The end result had been, in the end, him on a chair outside the NICU, sucking in ragged breaths and watching Lois' face crumple at the touch of her tiny cousin while Chloe hovered over him, in her hospital gown and robe, asking if he was going to be okay. It was irrational, he knew. Evander Holyfield in his prime would have been just as helpless before him as the boy was, but repeating that fact didn't seem to matter. One day the boy would have his growth spurt and go through puberty and come into the height and muscle his father's genes promised. For now though he was so little he was terrifying.

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It was during one of the boy's mysterious appearances in their apartment for the weekend that Lois suggested they drive out to Crater Lake. Perry was antsy and she thought there would be a better chance of peace and quiet if they were a few hours out of town that Saturday. He agreed, reluctantly. Lowell County was an inconvenient location for maintaining a low profile. People in Smallville remembered Lois now, ever since the _Inquisitor_ began running their series claiming she'd gotten her interview with Superman by sleeping with him, that she was Superman's girlfriend, and that she was carrying Superman's child. It had become difficult to run into Fordham's or even The Beanery without someone recognizing her. Lois, of course, took it all in stride and was even a little miffed when people weren't able to connect her to "the" Lois Lane, but even when they couldn't, they always remembered him. "Clark, how's your mother doing?" they'd ask, or "Clark, you wouldn't believe what Ben's kid is doing with the old place!", or "Clark, I just saw Sam Ross the other day, he's got another little one on the way. When are you two gonna think about having some kids?"

The problem wasn't the conversations themselves. They were usually a mix of the gossipy and the awkward, the expectation being that he would manage to remember and discuss the lives of people he hadn't seen since graduation. That he could handle. Six years at the _Planet_ had taught him how to smile and nod with the best of them. The problem was extracting himself once they'd begun. In Metropolis no one cared if he suddenly pulled out his phone and muttered, "You know, I've got a call to make / meeting I'm late for / source I need to meet", because everyone had somewhere to be and something else they could be doing. In Smallville, abruptness was next to rudeness and he had offended more than one of his father's old friends when the sound of squealing brakes or crying children had pulled him away. Not immediately away, however. Not anymore. Even in backwater Lowell County people would notice if he disappeared right in front of them, now that "vigilantes" and "capes" had become "superheroes".

However, Lois had riled the boy up by telling him they were going to go where Uncle Clark had played when he was the boy's age and after that the boy could talk of nothing else. Lois had told the boy so many stories about "Uncle Smallville" growing up the cows that said "moo" and the pigs that said "oink" and the chickens that had said "bawk! Bawk!" even though there had been no hogs and no chickens on the Kent farm. The boy loved those stories; he probably thought every night at the farm Uncle Clark had bounced with the bunny and strutted with the duck like something out of _Barnyard Dance_. Lois managed to distract him on the way out by playing _Wall-E_ on the media player in their rented mini-van, but as soon as they pulled into the parking lot he was at it again.

"Uncle Clark play here?" the boy demanded as soon as they unstrapped him from his car seat.

"Yes," Lois answered.

The boy began to run toward the bright purple-and-green playset the county had installed a few years before (and which Clark would have demolished if he'd ever played on it at the boy's age), but Lois grabbed his wrist. "You gotta hold my hand," she told him.

The boy pouted, and grabbed Clark's hand instead. Clark took it carefully and deliberately slowed his breath. If he concentrated no one would get hurt.

"You play here?" the boy asked him directly, pointing at the playground.

"Yep," Clark lied.

"Mama play here?"

"Sure," Lois said.

Clark didn't remember Chloe doing anything that could be called playing at Crater Lake, but of course, that didn't mean she hadn't. She and Pete might have come here sometime.

"Papa play here?"

"No, papa played in your house," Lois told him.

"Did you play here?" the boy asked Lois, suddenly discovering helping verbs.

"No," Clark answered."

"Hey!" Lois objected. "I played here sometimes. I played with Uncle Arthur," she told the boy. "We went swimming in the lake."

Clark grunted and Lois laughed. The boy, however, immediately wanted to know if they could go swimming now.

"Nah, it's way too cold for swimming," Clark told him.

The boy whined a little hearing that, so Lois yelled "I'll race you to the slide!" and began jogging at a pace so slow the boy looked as if he really had super-speed as he ran ahead of her.

"You slow!" the boy yelled back as he reached the slide.

"Oh yeah? I'll still beat you to the top!" Lois yelled back.

She almost did, Clark noted. The boy of course wanted Clark to play whatever game they had going on that involved scrambling all over the playground without touching the ground, so Clark did. Gingerly. He gently held the boy up so he could cross the monkey bars and the balance beam without touching the "lava" beneath them. There were so many other children though, scrambling around, crawling under and climbing over him that eventually his breathing began to pick up again and he had to go sit on one of the benches to calm it. Lois looked at him curiously but didn't say anything. If she did ask, he'd tell her how cute she looked playing with the boy. She really did, he thought – it wasn't hard at all to imagine the little kid she'd been, red-cheeked and high-spirited.

Sitting on the bench also allowed him to extract himself easily when the inevitable call came. Oliver's first question was how the boy was doing, and the second was whether Clark was watching the news.

"We're at the park," Clark told him.

"Lex is putting Oakland under martial law," Oliver answered. "He's moving tanks in as we speak."

Intervening in the never-ending sit-in, or occupation, or whatever it was in Oakland was an old argument, and one Clark didn't have any interest in today. "We voted," he replied.

"Goddammit, Clark. He's got tanks in there. How long do you think we have before he goes from detaining them to killing them?"

"You're the one who insisted on consensus. I'm not the one you should be talking to. Either change the rules or get Dinah on board. Right now I gotta go claim a picnic table for lunch."

"Fine. Give him a hug for me."

"Okay," Clark said. Clark tried to keep the hugging to a minimum. He hugged the boy every time his parents dropped him off and every time they picked him up and every time they tucked him into bed. Planned hugs like that were alright, but spontaneous hugs, like the ones preceded by his usual crash-landing into Lois, were unsafe and therefore discouraged. However, a small hug while they were both seated at the picnic table was doable, so that's what he did.

"That's from your dad," he told the boy as he set his phone on the table.

"Papa?" the boy asked. "Papa?" he repeated, grabbing Clark's phone. Fortunately the phone wasn't programmed to call anyone named "Papa". Lois traded the boy the phone for some yogurt and told Clark to put it away.

"What did Oliver want?"

"Oakland."

"Did you tell him to talk to Dinah?"

"Yeah." Clark took a bite of potato salad. "Who's covering that?"

"Not me!" she sang out. Perry wanted her close to Metropolis and Superman.

"No, really, who's got it?"

"Taibbi, I think."

"Yeah, he would." Perry would never pull Taibbi off and put him on.

"Bunny!" yelled the boy. Clark followed the general direction of his waving arm and saw a tiny rabbit that was the exact shade of the leaf mold on the ground freeze at the unwanted attention.

"Where?" Lois asked.

"Bunny," the boy repeated uncertainly, waving his arm harder. Recovering its wits, the rabbit leapt behind a nearby bush.

"Wow. You got good eyes, Robbie," Lois said. "I couldn't see it until it ran."

The boy stood up on the picnic bench. "Where he go?"

"Bunny's gone, kid. He went home."

"Home?"

"Yeah." Lois jerked her thumb at the bush. "It's probably his nap time."

"Bunny sleep?"

"Yep. Bunny sleep."

"Why?"

"Bunny's tired," Lois said. "Like you. I bet you're tired."

"No!" the boy bounced on the picnic bench, adamant. "Not tired!"

"Okay, okay. Not tired yet."

"NO!" the boy yelled. "Not yet!" He jumped off the bench and made for the bush. Lois grabbed him.

"Rob, buddy. Bunny's sleeping. We gotta protect Bunny while he's sleeping. Make sure, uh, the Gray Fox doesn't get to him."

"Who's Gray Fox?"

"He's one bad fox, lemme tell you," Lois answered.

The boy nodded solemnly. Then he turned to Clark, and, raising an imaginary bow, yelled "Stay away, bad guy! Phew! Phew! Phew!" With every "phew!" he released an imaginary arrow.

Clark had his role down cold. Grabbing at the invisible arrow in his chest, he flinched mightily, grunted, and fell off the bench.

"You dead, bad guy!" the boy announced.

"No, I'm not," Clark said, opening his eyes. "The Green Arrow never kills bad guys. He arrests them."

"I 'rest you," the boy informed him.

"No, you don't! You'll never catch me!" Clark scrambled to his feet and ran away at a much more respectable pace than Lois had, circling the bushes while the boy yelled behind him "I get you!" If they were lucky the boy would fall asleep on the way home. When the cooler was repacked he slowed so the boy could arrested him and then accepted Judge Lois' punishment condemning him to carry the cooler back to the car.

As he walked through the parking lot, he could hear the boy's grunts and whines as Lois wiped his hands and face down, and also Lois' "Hey!" when the boy decided he'd had enough. As he lifted the hatch he heard some scuffling and then the boy announcing: "Bunny's sleeping." As he closed the hatch he heard Lois reply, "What the – ? Oh, gross. Put that down, Rob-" which cut off to a muttered "dammit" as the boy scampered away. As he turned back to the picnic area he saw the boy running toward him, a tiny rabbit swinging limply from his hands. The boy saw him and smiled, lifting the rabbit as Lois dodged a couple of grandparents pushing a Graco stroller. As the boy reached the parking lot Clark smiled at him and the Ford Explorer in the last space backed out.

Backed out, and then braked, as the driver realized the truck had hit something.

Lois screamed.

Clark took a step.

And then another.

And then Clark broke into a run, a real run, toward where Robbie lay on the pavement and the hysterical Explorer driver clutched her face and the Graco-pushing grandfather was kneeling down and the terrified rabbit was running madly away. He stumbled over the older man, accidentally knocking the driver into her back fender, and scanned Robbie's body. There were no broken bones he could see, no cuts, no bleeding, no hair-line fractures, no muscle tears, no hemorrhaging.

There was no pulse, either.


	2. Chapter 2

Clark closed his eyes, shut his mind off from every distraction, and listened. Where there should be the wheeze of an inhale and the force of an exhale there was none. Where there should be the wub-WUB of blood rushing through Robbie's heart there was nothing. No breath. No heartbeat. Not for three counts. Or five.

Clark scooped Robbie into his arms. Behind him the grandfather was telling him the boy shouldn't be moved since it could exacerbate a back injury and someone else – Lois – was telling that voice to shut the hell up. Or maybe she was telling it to the sobbing driver or the woman with the stroller in tow who kept asking: "Clem? Clem, what's he doing? Tell him he can't do that!"

He had to get out of there. He had to get Robbie out of there, somewhere where there weren't so many people. Somewhere where he could breathe. He stood, shaky. He took a step toward the treeline, beyond the playground and picnic area. He took another step, and then another. If he could get to the trees he'd be in the clear. He could escape.

Naturally the self-anointed first-aid expert started shouting at him, the driver started screaming and the kid in the stroller began to whine. Lois crowded her way toward him and whispered, harshly, "What are you doing?" "What do you think?" he whispered back. He was past the playground now, only about thirty more yards to go. The crowd had stayed behind in the parking lot, except for the man who was mad he'd picked Robbie up. He followed close behind, remarking that he'd been a medic in the army and he'd seen the kind of damage spinal injuries could do, there were procedures for handling people –

There was a break in the old man's stride, then a grunt, then a thump. Then the old man was yelling, "What the hell do you think you're doing?" and Lois was apologizing profusely and offering to help the man up. It was wrong of her but it had slowed the old bastard enough to get him past the treeline, into the forest. His heart was hammering in his temples and wrists. He couldn't swallow. He couldn't think. He stopped. He looked around. He could see out to the playground through the trees, see Lois moving in front of his now-standing pursuer to prevent him from following. It was darker in the woods than it was outside of them though. They wouldn't be able to look into the trees at him.

He took off.

Robbie flopped in his arms when he landed, and for a moment his own heart stopped. He waited for Robbie's head to lift and his eyes to open, squinting against the harsh Artic sun, but they did not. He remained still and heavy in Clark's arms as he carried him into the Fortress.

"Father," he called.

There was no answer.

He tried to called out again, but his voice had broken and all that came out was "Fa..." and a jagged breath. He was crying, he knew. He could feel the tears pooling and the ache in his cheeks as he tried to stop them from falling.

He drew a deep breath.

"Father!" he yelled.

He heard the sound swallowed by the emptiness.

He drew another breath.

"FATHER!" he roared. "I NEED YOU!"

Again, there was no response. Clark looked down at Robbie. He had no bruises, no scars. In the hazy light of the Fortress he looked perfect and whole. As if nothing had happened. As if -

"Kal-El."

"Father!" He lifted up his head. He didn't know why. Unless Jor-El chose to show the hologram of himself there was nothing to look at.

"Is your need for yourself or for the child you bring?"

"It's for the child. For Robbie."

"The child is dead. What is it you wish for me to do?"

"I want," he said, taking a breath, working up his courage. "I want for him to live. Again. I want him to be able to live."

"There is nothing I can do for him. My son, you know this."

He did. He had stood here before with Jonathan Kent in his arms and begged for him to breathe again. He knew there was no other crystal. He knew it was futile. He knew it all, and still he stood here, shaking.

"The boy is – he's Lois' cousin," he said.

"Then it is right that you are saddened by his death. But the boy is moral, as are we all. Even you. We all must die."

"Not so young," he groaned. The tears were dripping now, falling on to Robbie's green-striped polo shirt. "Not so small," he whispered.

Jor-El did not respond, but a light encircled Clark. It was both brighter and hazier in the light. Warmer too, which made him suddenly aware of how cold it was outside its glow. "It is always difficult when a life ends before it has come to fruition." The voice from the crystals was calm. "But we are not petty gods, to chose at our whim who on this planet lives and who dies. That is why there was only one crystal; its use was meant as a test, not an expedient. It's lesson was to remind you that your destiny is to protect all of humanity. You cannot consider one above another." The light inside the circle shown brighter and somehow also softer. The air was damper in it than the air outside. He breathed it in and listened to the voice of Jor-El and was soothed. Comforted. In his mind he could see the boy lying motionless in the parking lot but even as he saw it, the scene shifted farther away. He could hear Lois' scream, feel the tightness in his chest, but the scream faded, the tightness passed, and then there was only the light, and the haze, and his father's even tone.

"Bring the child to his family," his father said. "They will want to bid him farewell. Remember your calling. If you cannot serve all, you cannot lead any."

"I understand," Clark said. The light faded and the outline of the surrounded walls became distinct. He turned and carried the boy out of the Fortress and into the sun. The solar light was both duller and harsher than the light inside the circle had been, but he welcomed it nevertheless. There was so little he could feel with his body anymore, outside of the arousal or anger. He didn't even feel real hunger anymore; most of the time when he ate it was to keep Lois company or avoid questions. But he could feel the sun. It was the only thing left that could touch him from outside, and he could feel his body crave it the way it had craved food when he was a boy.

The best place to absorb it was in orbit, watching the earth turn beneath him while he let himself be bombarded with cosmic radiation, but this place was a good fall-back in the summer. In summer, he would come up here and let the sun strengthen his body and the Fortress strengthen his mind, the way that it had now. He had come here in grief and he would leave in peace. What Jor-El had said was true. Even he would die someday. It was unfortunate that this child had died, but if he had not died today, it was assured that he would have at another time.

The boys parents would be upset, of course. They would grieve. That was natural. They would also recover, in time. That also, was to be expected. It was unhealthy to cling to what could not be. They knew that there were no guarantees. There was nothing more counter-productive than demanding the universe give you whatever you wanted whenever you wanted it, and certainly they, of all people, knew how much had been given them. It highly probable the universe would give them another child. He should remind them of that. Not right away, during the first pain, but later. To give them hope. That, after all, was why –

"Where we?"

Clark jumped. Only his super-powered reflexes kept him from dropping the boy on to the ice.

"Isss cold," the body added. He would know. He was beginning to shiver.

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Shivering, Clark knew, was the initial stage of hypothermia. It would be followed by mis-coordination and vasoconstriction. Robbie was wearing nothing but the play clothes Lois had dressed him in for the park. If he didn't get to somewhere warmer soon, he would begin to shiver more violently and his fingers and nose would lose blood flow and turn blue. Clark had to get him out of there. Unfortunately, he couldn't move. Couldn't act. Couldn't think. The fast, whoosing, impossible wub-WUB, wub-WUB of Robbie's heart filled his ears: wub-WUB, wub-WUB. It was louder than the hiss of the wind or the crunch of the snow; louder than the voice of the Fortress had been. Still he stood, there frozen. It had not been beating before; it had _not_. It shouldn't be now, and yet it was, was speeding up in fact: wub-WUBwub-WUBwub-WUB, his body trying to keep its blood moving, trying to warm itself from the inside.

They had to go.

He landed a few feet from where he'd taken off in the woods. Beyond the trees the man Lois had tripped was bellowing at her: "- care what your beliefs are! A child's life is at risk!" He needed to get back to the parking lot and pull Lois away before she decked the guy, but despite the temperature increase Robbie was still shivering. Clark took a breath and relaxed his eyes. A wave of warmth welled up in him and through him, softly surrounding Robbie's little form. After a minute or so the small body uncurled from the tight ball it had wrapped itself in and Robbie's head came up. "Where we now?" he asked.

"At the park," Clark said. He started walking toward the argument on the other side of the treeline. "We're going back home now."

"On the plane?"

"No, just back to the apartment." Ahead of him, Lois was telling the guy to get his Stasi ass back to Russia but the guy ignored her and pointed at Clark.

"You!"

Lois whirled. "Oh my God. Oh my God. Robbie!" She ran toward them as Clark strode forward, this time easily out-pacing her pot-bellied opponent. Robbie was no longer shaking but he was still wide-eyed and, Clark realized, probably hadn't processed what had happened to him at all. As soon as he saw Lois he began to wail and didn't stop even after she pulled him out of Clark's arms and wrapped hers around him like a bear. Catching up to them the pot-bellied stroller-pusher yelled at the bug-eyed crowd that even if everyone else wanted to stand around with their thumbs up their butts, he was going to call an ambulance. Clark pulled the phone out of the man's hand and flung it toward the lake. Not into the lake, because as much as he wanted to, he wouldn't use his strength in front of so many people, but far enough.

"What the fuck are you doing?" the man stopped and screamed. Clark, having passed him, turned, walked back, and collared him. There was a ripping sound as the collar detached from the shirt. "Do not ever use that kind of language around my kid," Clark said quietly. Then he turned to follow Lois, flinging the blue, tossing the blue, ribbed scrap of fabric that had come off in his hand.

Lois however was already at the mini-van, having stumbled and pushed her way through the crowd in the parking lot. Beside her the woman who'd hit Robbie was begging to know if Robbie was alright. Her sobs competed with Robbie's hiccup-y whines as Lois strapped him in his car seat, and the now-collarless man's entreaties for someone to lend him their cell phone. He ignored them all as he made his way to the van. He had an easier time of it as the rest of the crowd was probably loathe to incur the kind of property damage the shouting man had. He did pat the distraught driver on the shoulder, more to get her out of his way than to comfort her, but it did help quiet her a bit. "You'll let me know he's okay, won't you?" she asked as he crawled into the passenger seat. He nodded. She blew her nose.

Lois finished with Robbie, who was yawning now, and climbed into the driver's seat.

"Clark? What's going on?"

"Just get us out of here."


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** Thank you so much everyone who replied with feedback! Unfortunately I wasn't able to reply to everyone because not everyone had a reply link in the message that was sent. A couple of people had concerns about characters being out of character, which is of course always a risk writing fic as an alternate to canon (or, for me, at most any other time too). I'm very open to hear more specifics about your concerns, so if you still have them after this chapter please send me a message with a reply link. Thanks!

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_"Clark? What's going on?"_

_"Just get us out of here."_

Lois nodded and pulled the van out. Thankfully the gawkers moved out of the way as she did so, the adults keeping a firm hold on the kids. The interfering man had gotten himself a phone, Clark noticed, so he had to speed out and knock that from his hand as well, but he was back in the car before even Lois knew he'd done it. She was peeling out of the parking lot, rolling through the stop-sign and racing down the county road at 60 miles an hour less than a minute after strapping Robbie into his seat.

Clark twisted back to look at the gossiping by-standers surrounding the interfering man, who was howling about the disappearance of the second phone. He swallowed a few times. "I think that guy back at the lake is going to call the cops on us," he said.

"That sonuva-" Lois began, before remembering Robbie. She gave a quick glance back at him through the rear-view mirror and Clark heard her heart begin to speed. "His eyes are shut," she said. "Should they be shut?"

Clark switched his gaze to Robbie, conked out in his car seat. He was, from what Clark could see from X-raying him, perfectly healthy: still no soft-tissue damage, no damage to the skull or any other bones, temperature normal, heart-rate and breathing normal for sleeping. He reached back and shook him in his car seat. "Hey, buddy. Wake up. Hey. Robbie!"

Two reluctant toddler lids raised themselves to half-mast and two sleepy eyes stared at him resentfully with rapidly contracting pupils.

"He's fine," Clark said. "Aren't you buddy?" Robbie blinked a few times and then settled back against the side of car seat.

"Thank God," Lois breathed. She twisted around for a second to smile at her little cousin before giving Clark a worried frown. "Did you … did you bring him to your father?"

Clark nodded.

"What happened? What did he say?"

"He'll be fine," Clark mumbled. He felt odd, like his stomach was frozen. Or had gotten really tight.

"Okay, but what did he do? Did he give you any instructions, anything to watch out for? Say anything at all?"

"No." It was getting hard to swallow. His saliva felt thick and stringy in his mouth. "Pull over."

"He said 'pull over'?"

"No, you," he panted. "Pull over."

"Is something wrong?" she asked, but dutifully slid the mini-van to the side of the road. As soon as it stopped his door was open and his head was hovering over the gravel, his mouth spewing the ham sandwich and potato salad and baby-cut carrots he'd had for lunch over a clump of dandelions. In the back seat he heard Robbie sit up and begin to whine.

"Hey Robbie!" Lois called back. "Hey! It's okay. Just a pit stop. Go back to sleep."

Robbie ignored her, his thin, nasal wail turning into a full-throated sob while Clark dry-heaved.

"Okay, how 'bout we sing your song, baby boy," Lois suggested. "_Aquaman, Aquaman, doin' the things an Aquaman can! Talkin' to fishes, holdin' his breath_," she sang, weaving pitchily through Chloe's rewrite of _Particle Man_. Her hand ran up and down Clark's back in time to the music, which was a little too fast to be soothing, but he gave her credit for trying. Plus his abdomen had stopped convulsing, which helped. Sucking in what would have been, for a human, a giddy-making quantity of oxygen, he sat up and sang along with her: "_When he's underwater he's super-strong, fights the bad guys all day long, Everyone's friend, Aquaman._" They were both flat, but Robbie's cries quieted to whimpers when he saw Clark sit up and then faded completely when Lois started the car again.

"You gonna make it?" she asked.

He smiled reassuringly. "I will now."

She smiled back, not quite reassured. "What just happened with you? Did Jor-El -"

"Jor-El didn't do anything." That is, he didn't think he had. With Jor-El you never knew. "I think it just hit me all of a sudden that Robbie could have died."

She took his hand. "But he didn't." Her eyes were wide and her hand was trembling a little, but her voice was firm. In spite of her own anxieties, she was trying to comfort him. She always tried so hard.

"No," he agreed. "He didn't."

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It was quiet in the mini-van as they drove back. Robbie slept the entire ride to Metropolis and Clark told Lois he needed to listen for any deputies following them, which she didn't question even though they were back on the freeway and out of the Lowell County sheriff department's jurisdiction. As he listened, he could hear her heart slow until it was beating at its normal pace. She'd relaxed. The situation, as far as she was concerned, was under control. In her mind, Clark was on it and that was all she needed to know. That, more than anything she'd said, comforted him. She trusted in him so implicitly, and that meant he could trust her. Even now, when there was a huge question begging for an answer, he didn't have to worry about worrying her looking elsewhere for answers or going behind his back for solutions.

He loved her for that.

Her trust in him was precious and unique. It was a gift to him, one that he still didn't entirely believe was real. So many people had betrayed him, but Lois never would. He needed to protect that gift, and that meant he needed to be honest with her. He needed to tell her what had really happened. But neither could he dump unfounded suspicions on her willy-nilly. That wouldn't be fair to her. He had to be sure, himself, of what had happened before he unburdened himself to her. It was better to deal with the reality together than to let conjecture create doubts in her mind.

After all, it was _possible_ that what he had told her was true. Jor-El could have taken pity on him after he'd left the Fortress and revived Robbie. It was by far the most likely explanation. Jor-El could and did act remotely, and he had only begun to tap the secrets the Fortress held. The fact that there had been only one crystal designed to turn back time didn't mean that Jor-El couldn't resurrect Robbie.

The question was why would he have done so? For pity? For some other reason? His early relationship with Jor-El had been filled with trials Clark hadn't been had neither understood nor accepted. He'd thought, now that he had accepted his destiny, that the time of testing was over. Still, it was possible Jor-El thought he had more to learn. On the other hand, it wouldn't be like Jor-El to do so and not tell him. That thought bothered him – he was an _adult_ now, had been for _years_ – but he put it aside. If he was being tested, it was important that he focus on the lesson being taught. Robbie was alive again; that meant there would be ramifications to be dealt with. He needed to be alert to those and consider them carefully, and, he reminded himself, certainly before he discussed the matter any further with Lois. She adored Robbie, and she knew what had happened to Jonathan. It would kill her with worry to think that the same, or worse, might happen to her little cousin. On the other hand...

Clark had to force himself to finish that thought. On the other hand, Robbie might be perfectly fine. He might be perfectly fine for a long, long time. Longer than Lois might live. Far longer, in fact, than Lois would live. If, that was, Jor-El had not healed Robbie. If Robbie had, as it happened, revived for other reasons. Reasons like the energy he'd received from the clear Artic sun.

How Robbie would be able to do that, he had not idea. Well, maybe a small idea. A very small idea:_"You don't think we..." "Exchanged vows? Said 'I do'? Did the deed? Oh God. Don't say that."_

Clark grunted, shifting in his seat.

"You okay, Smallville?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah. It's a bit cramped."

"Yeah, well, A) The compact was a better deal, and B) Hello? _Invulnerability_."

"Being invulnerable doesn't mean I fit into a C-Max."

She offered him a commiserating grin. "Well, if he takes after Ollie at all, in a year or two he'll be out of that car seat and we can put him into the back of an extended cab."

He smiled, trying to match her recovering cheer. He also snuck in a look at Robbie, whose chin had fallen to his chest as he slept. "Grow fast, kid," he whispered. Lois chuckled. They sat in companionable silence for a moment or two before her smile fell and her brows came together.

"What are we going to tell them?" she asked.

"You mean Chloe and Oliver?"

She nodded.

"We'll tell them the truth."

"Of course," she said quickly. "But how? 'Sorry, Ollie, but we turned our backs on your kid for a second and he kinda got hit by a car?'"

"We'll just stick to the facts. They'll be mad at first, but they'll be happier he's alive."

"Mad? You think 'mad' is gonna cover it? Chloe's gonna shoot me. No, she's going to forbid me from ever seeing Robbie again, and then she's gonna shoot me. And then she's gonna whip out the Kryptonite on you."

Clark drew a deep breath. Chloe. He would need to talk to her, find out what she knew. What she had been keeping from him.

"I'm sure we'll survive," he said.

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They decided, after a short debate, to take Robbie directly to the Watchtower and text both Emil and Oliver to meet them there. Doctors, in Clark's experience, had a tendency not to notice the obvious, but it would be difficult even for them to explain how Robbie had survived his ordeal in such good shape to anyone who didn't know his secret. Besides which, there really wasn't a need for medical attention. He'd scanned Robbie every fifteen minutes or so during the trip and had yet to see anything odd, but Lois pointed out that nobody else could see what he saw; Oliver was going to want confirmation. Somewhat reluctantly, Clark agreed. Lois sent the messages once they hit the stop-and-go of Metropolis traffic while Clark tickled Robbie awake. As a treat Clark downloaded the LegoAngel app to his phone and let Robbie scroll through it with manic zest until they reached the Watchtower.

Courtney was on duty at that afternoon, which allowed Clark to relax a little. Courtney, like Lois, was not one for probing questions, at least not of her fellow teammates. Her smile for Robbie was as wide as his was shy, but after a few minutes of clinging to Lois and smiling back at, then hiding his face from, then lifting it up to smile again at Courtney, he relinquished his hold and demanded a keyboard to type on along-side his new crush.

"What happened?" Courtney whispered once she'd unplugged Robbie's keyboard from the tower. "He looks okay. Did he eat something funky?"

"No, nothing like that," Lois said.

"He'll be fine," Clark reassured.

"We're just being cautious," Lois added.

"It broke," Robbie announced.

Courtney smiled at him. "What's broke, sweetie?"

Robbie rolled his eyes, and pointed at the monitor,. "The 'puter." He pounded a few more keys. "See?"

"How 'bout we let Courtney fix it in peace," Lois told him.

"How 'bout you fill me in on what happened?" Oliver said from the doorway.

"Papa!" Robbie yelled, jumping off the stool Courtney'd dragged out of storage for him and throwing himself into Oliver's arms. "Papa! We went, um, we went to the cold place and um, we went really fast, and um, um, Uncle Clark throwed up."

"He did?"

"Yeah, he went, um, he went blaaaargh," said Robbie. "Like this: BLAAAAARGH." To demonstrate he leaned over Oliver's arm and stuck out his tongue. "BLAAAAARGH."

"Really." Oliver's lips twitched. "Did he throw up in the cold place?"

"No. After."

"After the cold place?"

Robbie nodded. "Clark was just so worried," Lois interjected.

"But everything's fine now," Clark said. His cheeks were hot. Robbie obviously got the grand-standing gene from his Sullivan side.

"I'm sure it will be, but I gotta admit I'll feel better once I know what's going on. Lois, your text said there was an accident?"

"There was," she answered.

"So all you've told me is it was bad enough that he had to go to 'the cold place,' which, no offense, doesn't exactly soothe my troubled mind."

"It should," Lois said. There was the slightest of edges to her voice as she said it. "Jor-El saved Robbie's life."

"Your saying Robbie could have _died_?"

"He'll be fine," Clark repeated for what felt like the hundredth time. "He's got no broken bones, no bruises, no pupil dilation. There's nothing wrong with him."

"You don't mind if we double-check that, do you Big Blue?" It shouldn't have bothered Clark that Oliver immediately set the boy on Chloe's old desk and started running his hands over him, but it did.

"How are you feeling, buddy?" Oliver asked. "Do you feel dizzy? Like your head's a little wobbly?" Oliver demonstrated with his own head and Robbie giggled, twisting his own head around. "Okay, you don't feel dizzy. Can you see okay? How many fingers is Papa holding up? Show me with your hand." Robbie carefully unpeeled his right index and middle fingers from his fist and held them up with his left hand. "Okay, good job."

"I told you," Clark gritted. "He's fine."

"Yeah, you know what? I just sent my kid out to lunch with the Man of Steel and now I find out he's been in an accident so bad the only you'll tell me about it is that you had to visit the Winter Palace to make it all better. You'll forgive me if I'm a little anxious. Lois, you said you called Emil?"

"This is not Clark's fault. Some stupid bitch pulled her stupid, giant SUV out of a parking spot and she wasn't looking and she hit Robbie. There was no way Clark could have stopped it without revealing to the whole damn town that Su … that the _Man of Steel_had been their next-door neighbor for 20 years. Is that what you would have wanted?"

"Yes!" Oliver yelled. "Jesus Christ, Lo! You think I'm gonna be objective where my kid's life's at stake?"

Lois opened her mouth to yell back, but fell silent when Robbie gave a little grunt from where he'd been smushed into Oliver's chest. Oliver loosened his hold on the boy but kissed his forehead.

"Too hard!" Robbie protested.

"I'm sorry, buddy."

The exchange seemed to dampen Lois' fire. Her shoulders slumped and her chin quivered. "It was like a nightmare happening right in front of us. I don't think either of us really believed it was happening. I mean... What else …" She wrung her hands. "I am so, so sorry."

Hearing the apology, Oliver's ire dissipated as well. He gave her a tired little smile. "Did you a least punch the driver for me?"

"No. She was a mess. If she'd known she'd hit the Gre-, well, if she'd known who's kid he was we woulda have to have carted her off to Belle Reve."

At "who's kid he was", Clark flinched. No one noticed. Both Oliver and Lois were focused on Robbie, who was leaning out of Oliver's arms and reaching for Lois. The kid did have such a strong affinity for her, the way Connor had. Could that attraction be genetic? Was it possible to pass something like that on? Granted, Connor was a clone of him, but only a partial clone. He only shared half his genes with Clark – just as any natural-born child of his would. It was something to consider. He knew nothing about what to expect from a non-genetically engineered offspring. For that matter, he knew almost nothing about what to expect from the early years of a genetically engineered offspring. He wondered if Tess had kept any records, and, if so, where they might be.

Lost in that train of thought, he jumped when he heard Emil's footsteps crossing the threshold. "Sorry I'm late; this year's batch of students needs some extra hand-holding," the doctor said. "Hey, Robbie!"

Robbie stared at the doctor, then at Oliver.

"Hi Dr. Hamilton!" said Lois, full of encouragement. Robbie craned his head up to look at her. The kid was smart enough to know something was up, if not exactly what.

"I heard you had an accident," said Emil to Robbie. "How are you feeling?"

Robbie leaned his head into the crook of Lois' neck.

"Do you feel dizzy?" Emil asked. "You feel like you have to throw up?"

Robbie sat up in Lois' arms. "No. Uncle Clark did!"

Emile turned to frown at Clark. Balling his hand up, in quick succession he pointed his index finger and then made a 'V' with his thumb in the joint. G K – Green Kryptonite. Clark shook his head.

"Well, that sounds exciting," Emil told the boy. "How 'bout you and Aunt Lois and your dad come upstairs with me? Have you been upstairs here?"

Robbie shook his head. "No."

"Well then it's time to explore strange new worlds," Emil told him. He led the way up the stairs, followed by Lois carrying Robbie and Oliver. Clark, uninvited, followed as well. In the medical bay Lois deposited Robbie on the cot while Emil punched a few buttons on the equipment and asked Oliver, in a low voice, "What happened?"

"From the sounds of it, an SUV," Olivered answered.

Emil looked at him sharply. "Was he hit?"

Lois nodded. "He was running across the parking lot and a driver pulled out without seeing him. Luckily Clark was able to get him up to the, uh, 'cold place'."

Emil stopped punching buttons. "I see. And what happened at the 'cold place'?"

"We went fast," offered Robbie.

"I bet that was fun," Emil said.

"Yeah, and then he throwed up -"

"Robbie, right now Papa and Aunt Lois and Uncle Clark need to talk to Dr. Hamilton," Oliver interrupted.

"It wasn't anything momentous. I ran him up there and Jor-El did the rest," Clark told Emil.

"Examined and treated him?"

"I'm a flopsy bunny," Robbie informed Lois.

"The Fortress is programmed to accelerate tissue regeneration," Clark said.

"You are?" Lois asked.

"You call that 'nothing momentous' and I'd give my left arm to know how it was done. Hey Robbie, can you look up at me for a minute?"

"An' you a mopsy bunny," Robbie told Lois while Emil shone a penlight into his eyes.

"You'd have a mine a lot of space debris to replicate it at the hospital," Clark said with a smile.

"Robbie, sit still," Oliver said.

"Crystals can be synthesized. If we knew how the crystals of the fortress were coded, we could make them to spec, replicate their functions and bring them to patients all over the world."

There was something in his eagerness Clark found disconcerting, although he wasn't sure exactly what it was. "Maybe. I'm not sure humanity's capable of handling _all _their functions."

"You're not giving us much credit," Emil answered before turning his attention back to his patient. "Hey, Robbie. How does your tummy feel? Does it hurt?"

Robbie shook his head.

"What about your head? Does your head hurt at all?"

Robbie shook his whole body this time, flopping back and forth on the cot.

"Okay. Can you touch your fingers to your nose? Like this?" Emil lifted one arm, then the other, to shoulder level and tapped his nose alternately with the forefingers of each hand.

Robbie guffawed, for some reason known only to him finding the operation funny, but he managed to mimic Emil perfectly.

"Well, you don't appear to be have coordination problems. What about walking?" Emil asked the adults. "Is he maintaining his balance?"

Lois shook her head. "Not that I've noticed. He slept most of the way back. Is that bad?"

"It's not recommended, but if the 'cold place' really did what Clark says it can do," he said, darting a quick glance at Clark, "I'd say he's fine. His pupils contract. He's got no nausea, no headache, he remembers what happened to him afterward, he appears alert and stable. You may want to schedule a CT scan; in fact, if you do I'd be curious to see the results, but he looks thriving to me."

"So is it safe to bring him back to Star City to see his pediatrician there or should I make an appointment here?" Oliver asked. There was a bit more edge to his voice than Emil's explanation warranted, thought Clark, but then Oliver had just been walloped with a nearly averted catastrophe.

"It's your call. In other circumstances I'd be worried about the plane ride; kids can go downhill pretty quickly, with little or no warning, and you wouldn't want to be stuck in the air when he does, but I'm sure Clark would be available for back-up. I know with Chloe's situation you're probably anxious to get home."

Clark frowned. No one had mentioned a "situation" to him. "What's going on with Chloe?" he asked.


	4. Chapter 4

"_It's your call. ... I know with Chloe's situation you're probably anxious to get home."_

_Clark frowned . No one had mentioned a "situation" to him. "What's going on with Chloe?" he asked._

Emil looked at Oliver. Oliver looked at Lois. Lois smiled at Robbie.

"Hey buddy. Wanna go down with your Aunt Lois and see if your Uncle Bart left any ice cream in the freezer?"

"Noooooooo," Robbie answered. "Bunnies don't eat ice cream."

Lois' eyes widened. It was not the answer she'd been expecting. "Huh. Okay. Maybe Uncle Bart left some carrots here. Bunnies love carrots. Should we hop on down and dig some up?" Robbie nodded enthusiastically, jumped off the cot and sort of hop-skipped to the stair-case. Lois scurried after him, grabbing his shoulder just before he hurdled himself down the stairs. "After me, Rob."

"What's Chloe situation?" Clark whispered once they were half-way down.

Oliver sighed. "We think she may have been taken into custody. There was a whole group of them from the _Register_ that went out -"

"Went where?"

"To Oakland. They're covering the protests."

"In _Oakland_? You said Lex was sending tanks in there!"

Oliver lifted a finger to the vicinity of his lips. "Hey – keep it down. Yes, the tanks were ordered in earlier today, but the _Register_ crew slipped in last night. They were live-steaming footage until just after ten Pacific time this morning. Now the stream's gone dark and she's not answering her cell."

"She went in there without her comm?" Clark asked, incredulous.

"She went in there for a story, not a mission. The team's not getting involved, remember?"

"Which is exactly why you shouldn't have let her do this! It's completely irresponsible –"

"Wow, this is so weird. I'm having the strangest feeling. It's like _d__é__j__à__ vu_. Have we had this conversation before?"

Maybe in Oliver's mind they had. The man had a habit of occasionally referencing situations Clark couldn't even imagine happening as if they were shared history. Oliver's allegations – not to mention his sarcasm – were an argument for another day, however. "Whatever Chloe may have made in the past, she has a son now. It's not fair to Robbie."

"Oh, and you think you know what's fair to Robbie? I suppose letting him get hit by a truck so you could preserve your secret identity, that would be your definition of fair?" Oliver turned to Emil. "Thanks for coming, Doc. We'll be in touch." Emil nodded in return but Oliver was already at the stairs.

Clark groaned to himself. "Oliver-"

Oliver ignored him. "Robbie," he called down, "get your carrots together. We're going home."

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Lois couldn't believe Oliver had said what he'd said to Clark. She also couldn't believe Chloe'd scooped her. Well, not scooped exactly. "It's not like she got there first," she told Clark that evening as they stared up at the flat-panel screens above the bull-pen, where FOX, Al Jazeera English, and the BBC were all broad-casting the same footage of army trucks rolling toward the Oakland docks ahead of an M1 Abram. "I mean, the freakin' _Tehran Times_ has already covered it. But she used me. She used me to baby-sit while she got a story. That's got to be a violation of journalistic ethics, don't you think?"

"It wasn't just Chloe," Clark reminded her. The viewpoint of the shots switched to various locations on the street, indicating that the entire team had been moving constantly, filming simultaneously and broadcasting randomly, probably in an attempt to (temporarily) thwart the authorities from pin-pointing the source of the stream.

"No, it wasn't just her, but you think the _Register_ could have pulled this off without the spy equipment she supplied?"

"Queen Industries supplied," he corrected, but the point was the same. The project wouldn't have happened if Chloe and Oliver hadn't enabled it together, a fact that even that that bastion of journalistic ignominy, the _Inquisitor_, had noticed. They'd dubbed the entire encampment "Chloxey's Army" and insinuated it was being secretly financed by the "Queen of Oakland". The _Inquisitor_'s profile had sky-rocketed since Lex had granted them exclusive access to his campaign, in return, it was assumed, for running whatever stories President Luthor wanted them to run during his administration. The current crop criticizing the Queens was, no doubt, Lex's way of countering the ubiquitous images of the US military being activated against US citizens. LNN's coverage had been subtler, befitting the network Lex had had to divest himself of when assuming office, but just as poisonous. It ran footage of anarchists at the 2014 Oklahoma City convention and talking heads discussing whether the same group could be coordinating with "known vigilante Oliver Queen".

Clark could feel his eyes itching in frustration. It had been beyond stupid for her to go in. Not only was she rotting in jail cell as a result, but it had put thrust both them and the Justice League into the public's sights in a way they hadn't been since Godfrey disintegrated.

Her team from the _Register_ had gotten some great shots though.

"She could have at least invited me," muttered Lois as the scenes onscreen switched to commercial or network analysis.

"Then you'd be in jail too."

"Better me than her. Like you told Oliver, it's not fair to Robbie." No, it wasn't, which was why he'd been up late into the night arguing with Dinah. Yes, Chloe had made her choice and needed to be responsible for it, but Robbie needed his mother more.

And Clark needed to know what she knew. The possibility that Robbie was in-part Kryptonian was unlikely – it was extremely unlikely – but he couldn't yet eliminate it as impossible, and until he could the possibility would nag at him. More than nag: the idea made him twitchy, the way the sawdust in his nose had the summer he'd been mortal. Definitely, he would breathe easier once he knew. And once he'd discussed it with Chloe, he'd be able to discuss it with Lois. Give her the _facts_. Lois deserved them, and Chloe had them. She had to have. Even if she was unsure about the timing of conception, there had to be have been indications by now.

In fact, he realized, there already had been. Robbie'd been a preemie, born eight weeks early, and had made remarkable strides after his birth, gaining weight at a phenomenal rate. Phenomenal, he was sure, for a purely human infant. For one that could metabolize yellow sunlight, on the other hand, it was merely a matter of catching a few rays. She had to have noticed that, surely. She was always noticing things, usually at the most inconvenient times. If she'd been able to notice there was something odd about his adoption, she had to have been able to notice there was something biologically unusual about her own son.

"It's not as if she's been able to do any follow-up from prison," Lois continued once all channels had gone to commercial.

"No, she hasn't," he agreed. But she did have every reason to suspect Robbie was his son. He'd seen it on her face when he'd pulled her out of his closet that morning after the party. First her suspicion and then her immediate discard of that suspicion. Like a jerk he'd followed her lead and discarded it too. He hadn't even blinked when she and Oliver had announced her pregnancy. By that time that night had been completely out of his mind.

"That was a hint, Smallville," Lois stage-whispered.

"What?" His attention snapped back to his fianceé.

"A hint," she repeated, grabbing his wrist and pulled them away from the crowd gathering around the monitors. "You know, it's when I make a subtle suggestion and you get it without me having to explain it to you."

"What suggestion did you make?"

"Follow up. We could follow up."

Clark crossed his arms. "Perry's not going to let you anywhere near this story with a family member involved."

"He will if Superman gives me a few relevant quotes on the matter."

Clark sighed. "Lois..."

"Just listen! All Superman has to do is make a few statements in support of the First Amendment."

"That'll just give Lex the excuse he's looking for to label Superman a terrorist sympathizer. Just look at the way his people are talking about Oliver."

"Nobody's gonna criticize Superman for supporting the Constitution; it'd be like taking a stand against mom's apple pie. Besides, people are already asking where Superman was during this. If yo-" Clark frowned, and she caught herself. "If Superman doesn't speak up it'll look as if he approves of this."

"Superman doesn't get involved in politics," he said sternly. "He's not here to impose his will on people."

"Of course he's not. He's just making sure Lex Luthor doesn't either."

Clark considered that. Lex's presidency was a waking nightmare, true, but he hadn't forged every vote, and even if Clark had enough jewel Kryptonite to persuade every member of Congress to impeach him, he wouldn't. That wasn't what he'd been sent here to … to …

He couldn't remember what he'd been sent here to do. His vision had blurred. The only thing he could see clearly was Lois looking up at him with big, soft eyes, full of love and pride. Seeing her look at him like that made his chest tighten a little. It was so difficult to believe some days she loved him. Him, the kid who hadn't been able to walk twelve feet without stumbling. He was loved by such amazing woman, a woman who could have had any man she'd wanted, a billionaire even. But she'd wanted him.

She'd loved _him_.

He sighed.

"Okay," he said. "Superman might have a thing or two to get off his chest."

Lois squealed and threw her arms around his neck. Clark smiled, blinking.

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Two days after the interview was printed (_The Daily Planet_: "Superman Scolds Luthor: "Peaceable Assembly Is The American Way"), Chloe was still in jail (LNN: "Is Chloe Queen Who She Says She Is?") and Rachel Davenport committed suicide (_USA Today_: "Star of 'Warrior Angel: The Movie' and 'Star Trek: Return to Vulcan' Found Dead in Her Los Angeles Home"). News of the later, including the medications she was rumored to be using, the contents of her suicide note that had been withheld from the press and the grief of all her co-stars on the Whitney Houston biopic she'd just finished, was all over Twitter, the tabloids and fan forums. The _Register _and the _Planet_ were the only two media outlets that day to headline the news that a federal judge had denied the administration's request to transfer the "Oakland Six" to federal jurisdiction, returning the case back to the state courts.

It was an alarming juxtaposition of events. The timing of Rachel's death, in the upswing of her career, just after she'd announced her engagement, and right when Lex would be desperate for any distraction, was chillingly convenient. It also raised questions about Lex's memory. Clark was probably one of ten people in America to know both Chloe Sullivan-Queen and Rachel Davenport, and he was the only one from the same town where Lex had lived in the seven years before his death/disappearance/three-year personal day. Had Lex remembered something? Had he suspected the truth Clark had withheld from him those seven years? And if he had, what was his game? Was he hoping to draw Clark out? Did he think Superman would fly up to the White House and into his trap?

Or was he being paranoid? It was difficult not to be with Lex. Even without his memories he was obsessed with metas and with Superman in particular; it was as if the serum Tess had injected into him had only deepened his obsessions. And there was nothing Clark could do about any of it, which just served to feed his own fears. Dinah had flat-out refused to sanction a team move against the prison where Chloe was being held and even if he could convince Perry the evidence for suicide didn't add up, tawdry murder cases weren't the sort of stories the _Planet_ ran on Page 1. Remembering the copy of _The Seven Habits of Highley Effective People_ someone had gotten him for his high-school graduation, he decided to focus on what could do. Planting his butt in his desk chair, he typed out a condolence letter to Rachel's parents, explaining that he'd been lucky enough to meet her while she'd been filming 'Warrior Angel' in his hometown and how kind and gracious she had been. Then he went to the Watchtower and dug up Emil's research into Connor's DNA.

Then he went to the University library to speed-read a few books on genetics.

That night he took Lois to see the new Rambo remake. After, she pulled out some desert camo gear she'd filched the last time she'd visited the General and they played a little game of reconnaissance and infiltration. It was fun, and even relaxing, but not as much as he'd hoped it would be. While Lois' breath deepened and evened beside him, he lay awake. They would never be able to play those kinds of games with a child in the apartment, he thought, apropos of nothing. Nor would there be anymore impromptu flights to New Orleans for beignets or Chicago for pizza or Baltimore for crab cakes. No more Sundays on Hawaiian beaches or St. Patrick's Day parades in Boston. No more all-nighters at the _Planet _or the Watchtower. A child would change their whole lives.

He'd known that, of course. Had discussed it with his mother when she'd offered – insisted, in fact – that Connor come live with her in D.C. "You and Lois need time to just be a couple," she'd said. "You can't do that with a child in the house, even one as grown as Connor." A child was responsibility and vigilance and work, and they both already had so much on their plates. Adopting was out of the question, at least for now. Not until they had established their careers, gotten the League established, harried Lex out of office.

But nature may not have given him a choice. Nature may have simply done what he had never believed she could do and taken matters into her own hands. His reading that day had covered mostly the basics, so he still didn't have a good grasp on whether it was possible, outside of lab conditions, for him to have a child with a human woman. But he still didn't know that it was impossible, either. As it stood there was a chance he may have fathered a child, and that child might be curled up in a bed in Star City right now, dreaming of Superman.

His heart began pumping loudly enough he was surprised it didn't wake from her adorable, even if a little heated, discussion of lemon pudding. He might have a child. His child. _His_. That meant... well, it meant a lot of things. They would have to be even more on guard than with an adopted child. They'd have to falsify medical records. Move to a more isolated area, somewhere where sudden storms and fires wouldn't be noticed as quickly. Cut off all social contacts outside the League. Do all the things his parents had done to keep him safe.

Staring at the popcorn coating of the bedroom ceiling, he understood, for the first time, the enormity of what they had done, taking him in. They'd given up any hope of his mother helping to support the family during years of falling prices by taking a job off the farm; there was no way he could have been left in a daycare. They'd had to stop attending church and Grange meetings. They'd had to lie to everyone they knew about "Clark's medical issues" and accept the prayers of the neighbors that he'd be healed of his asthma/autism/allergies soon. And they'd done so willingly, cheerfully, _eagerly. _They had loved him that much.

Lara's greatest fear for him had been that he would not be loved, but he always had been. At times it had been hard to remember that, knowing how alone he was in the universe. Robbie would never have to have that crushing loneliness though. Robbie would have his father with him to teach him all about Earth: how to find the Big Dipper and the North Star in the night sky; how to tie his own shoelaces and fishing flies and slip knots for lead ropes; how to tell true morels from the false ones. Robbie'd also have his dad to teach him all the things Clark had had to figure out on his own: how to throw a ball without throwing it through a tree; how to trim his own toenails with heat vision; how to let go of the ground and let himself soar.

Clark drummed his fingers against the bedspread. He glanced at Lois, who had settled down and was snoring softly. He stared back at the ceiling again. He'd be back before she woke. Even if he wasn't he could just tell her he'd heard something and went to investigate.

He sat up. Easing himself off the bed as softly as possible, he walked out to the balcony off the living room and took off, flying west. When he got to the Queen estate there was Robbie, just as he should be, sacked out in bed, feet on the pillow, head lolling in the center of the mattress. His mouth was open and he was drooling a little. That would be his Sullivan-Lane side coming out again, Clark decided. He was, from what Clark's vision could tell him, still perfectly fine. No cuts, no scrapes, no bruises. He knew there wouldn't be and yet he still had to fight the urge to fly down and feel his forehead, to know with as many senses as possible that he was completely healthy and whole.

He resisted it. Aside from the risk of Robbie waking and finding him there, Oliver had taken up residence in a rocker in the corner of the room, huddled over the light of his touch-pad. Clark could, perhaps, persuade Robbie he was dreaming, but Oliver would need a thump on the head before he believed that. Oliver would probably need a thump on the head before he would believe Robbie wasn't his son – and he'd get it if Robbie's strength began exhibiting itself anytime soon. Clark couldn't imagine a less pleasant way for a man to find out his son wasn't really his. It was critical that he be told soon.

But how? "Sorry, Ollie, you went to the casino for a few hours on your wedding night and I kinda slept with your wife?" That would go over like a ton of lead, even if it was the only way Clark could think of for Robbie to have been conceived. True, he couldn't remember the details of said conception, but it was the only real opportunity for it to have happened, given Robbie's birth date. Given also that he was 100% sure he and Chloe had never had sex at any other time. That they may have that night was surely awkward, but the wine Zee'd supplied had had them all a little out of character. Especially Lois. She'd said specifically that night she was never taking her ring off. She'd called it her "sparkly little ball-and-chain". What exactly she'd meant by that Clark wasn't sure. Now that he thought about it, it didn't sound entirely positive. The point, however, was that she'd never have gambled it away if it weren't for that wine, nor, he would bet, would Chloe and Oliver have decided so impetuously to get married. Nor, he was positive, would he and Chloe have had sex.

Unfortunately, Emil hadn't been there to record it. That meant no proof anything happened, and no proof meant waiting for one of the mansion's load-bearing walls to collapse when Robbie kicked it before he'd be believed. He thought for a moment and then glanced at the clock on Oliver's touch pad. 10:12 PST. That would make it 6:12 GMT. Zee would be awake by now. He took a last look at Robbie, still sprawled out 180 degrees from standard. Sending him a mental hug, he turned and flew north-east.


	5. Chapter 5

**Please see author's note at the end of this chapter.**

* * *

_But what could he say?"Sorry, Ollie, you went to the casino for a few hours on your wedding night and I kinda slept with your wife?" That would go over like a ton of lead, even if it was the only way Clark could think of for Robbie to have been conceived. _

_Unfortunately, Emil hadn't been there to record it. That meant no proof anything happened, and no proof meant waiting for one of the mansion's load-bearing walls to collapse when Robbie kicked it before he'd be believed. He thought for a moment and then glanced at the clock on Oliver's touch pad. 10:12 PST. That would make it 6:12 GMT. Zee would be awake by now. He took a last look at Robbie, still sprawled out 180 degrees from standard. Sending him a mental hug, he turned and flew north-east._

As it turned out, Zee was not awake. Nor, he discovered after several minutes of banging on her apartment door, was she alone. Luckily the bleary-eyed blond man who'd followed her to the door was content, after a brief once-over, to give him a disgruntled look before pulling a cigarette out of a crumpled white-and-purple pack and lighting it on his way back to the bedroom. Not that his being there was the end of the world, but it did put a crimp into Clark's plan.

As did Zee's stubbornness once he explained why he'd sped her to the roof.

"We need to talk," he said.

Zee arched a tired brow. "Clark, it's six in the morning. If you have anything to say after dragging me out of bed like that it better be that the Big One just hit Star City."

"Ah, no." It occurred to him that he might have jumped the gun a bit coming here. "That's the good news!" he joked. She failed to laugh. "No, I, uh, need to know what happened the night of my bachelor party."

"Okay," she said, looking around. Spotting the service door, she patted him on the shoulder. "I'm going back to bed. Have a nice day, tell Lois I said 'hi'."

Clark grabbed her wrist before she could lift her hand. "Zatanna, please. I might have … done something … that night. Something that could have unimaginable consequences." Well, they'd been unimaginable to him a few days ago. Now they were just difficult to fully comprehend. "I need to know if I did what I think I did."

Pulling her hand away, she crossed her arms and grinned at him. "Oh, I think you'd be surprised at what I can imagine."

"I'm serious."

"You usually are. Why do you think I sent that wine to the party?" She sighed. "Okay. So what is it you think you did?"

"I can't tell you." Not before he and Chloe had discussed it, and not before they had talked to Lois and Oliver. It wouldn't be fair.

"That makes it a little harder to help."

"There are other people involved. It would … violate their privacy."

"Would one of those people involved be Lois?"

"Yes," he said quickly.

"Then discretion's definitely the better part of valor." She sighed again and lifted her eyes to the sky, thinking. "Do you have anything from that night?" she asked after a minute. "Something you haven't used a lot since then? A memento?"

Clark thought quickly. He'd put back all the stolen street signs the next day; lasered the plastic blow-up crap and half the shoes in his closet after they pulled Lucky out of there; and handed the lemur over to the Humane Society. Chloe and Oliver's wedding rings were about the only things to have survived the general clean-up effort and he wasn't about to fly back and ask Oliver if he would lent him his. "No. It all got trashed."

"That's unfortunate. Without something to physically connect with from that night, all I can do is a general memory spell, and it's not very specific. You don't have any Christmases with creepy uncles in your past that you've tried to forget, do you?"

"Not exactly," he said. Try as he might, he'd never be able to forget Zor-El. "Why do you ask?"

"Because it's possible you'd remember it. It's sort of like a magical smash-and-grab. I break down your mental blocks and pull out whatever's on the other side."

"So, I'll be able to remember what happened that night?"

"Hopefully."

"You created that mental block!"

Zee gave him the stink eye. "This is what you get at six in the morning after a heavy night. You want something more precise, give me a few days."

Clark shut his eyes for a second to keep them from over-heating. "Can't you just reverse whatever spell you put on the wine?" he asked.

"No, I can't," she answered. Her voice was patient but the hand on her hip was not. "The wine doesn't exist anymore, so neither does the charm."

"It has to. I still can't remember anything about that night."

"Maybe you don't want to remember what happened that night."

"Nobody else remembers what happened that night."

Zee flung up her hands. "So none of you want to remember. It's nothing personal. Sometimes we're just happier not knowing. But, in your case, that's obviously _not_ the case," she said hurriedly after catching his eye. Then she sighed again. "You know, a lot of magic is about just freeing your mind from the pressures on it. If you just let yourself relax, it's possible it'll come back on its own. I can help you do that."

Something in her tone made Clark stiffen. "I don't have the time for that."

She shrugged. "Suit yourself." She lifted one of her hands. "Siel era ysae ot ekam tuo, tub detsiwt hturt setaerc tbuod, thgil fo yad sekam dooheslaf tuor, dna htiw ym sdrow eht hturt lliw tuo!" A flash of light too bright even for him burst from her raised hand to his eyes. He winced, grimaced, and blinked. When he could open them again nothing had changed. They were still on the roof, it was still morning in London and she still looked tired and crabby.

Clark waited a moment after she'd stopped talking before frowning. "That's it?"

"Yep. That's it."

"Nothing happened."

She waved a hand. "Patience, grasshopper."

"You said," he said, and stopped. He could hear Jor-El. Not just in his head, but all around him, ringing off the walls of the cave. _"Go with Kara, Kal-El." _"What was that?" he asked.

"What was what?" Zee asked in response.

"That," he said, but Chloe was asking him a different question: _"Why is my mouth minty?" _He could see her puzzled face between the sculptures surrounding Kyle Tippet's trailer. As soon as he could open his mouth to answer, the image faded, replaced by a computer monitor in the school library. He was typing: "_Sherman's neckties were railway rails destroyed by heating them until they were malleable and twisting-" _and then an IM appeared over his paper, flashing lights. Before he could process that he was talking to Chloe again, telling her in the _Torch_ office, "_Well, you have to understand there are some things about me that'll never add up" _and hearing her say _"I know that." _She looked so young. And hurt and confused and resigned or maybe one of a million other things; trying to decode her expressions was too much for any man sometimes.

Except in the next memory – they were his memories, he was sure of that now, even though they were as foreign to him as Oliver's would be. In the next memory, her pupils were dilated and she was panting a little. She looked... turned on. _"It'll cost you a groaning to take off my edge," _he was telling her and he knew exactly why he would use that double entendre with her looking like that, but it was still a shock. To see it. See it happening. With Chloe.

"_She served her purpose... as has Jonathan Kent."_ He started. He was in the caves again, Jor-El's voice filling them, a light shining from within them. His dad was there, he could sense him, physically, standing behind him.

And then they poured over him, thick and confused, too fast for him to guess where and when and why they'd happened:

_The dirt was gritting into his wounds and it stung, but it was futile to brush it away. In the dark he could hear faint, random scratching a little below him. _

"_He's not my father. He tried to prevent me from being reborn." _

"_See, you've sort of...taken it upon yourself to be Smallville's self-appointed hero. And if you ask me, I think that … that is amazing."_

"_Chloe, I need you to be completely honest with me.""Honest, huh?" "What'd I do?" "You trusted me." _

"_When the buzz fades I'm really not going to regret doing this. Really."_

"_Come forward or he will die. Come to me, Kal-El." _

_Crushing tons of darkness pressed into him and over him like a cosmic womb._

"_I have freaked out every alley cat in a four-block radius!" "You gotta give it some feeling, some passion." "STOOOOOOOOP!"_

"_You didn't have to wait 'til the last second, you know!" "Where's the fun in that?"_

"_You're gonna forget your friends, your experiences. You're gonna forget me... you're gonna forget me." _

"_Five card stud. But it looks like all you got is a pair." "And I suppose you have a straight flush?" "Damn straight I do."_

"_Everything I've ever done, right or wrong... I did for you."_

_Then there was light. Light, all around him. Light, sparkling in the clear air. He breathed it in, drunk it, opened every cell to it. __He didn't know what is happening to him, only that it was the most wonderful thing that ever had happened. _

"_Kal-El, my son. Now you shall be reborn."_

_Now I am reborn._

_Now._

He looked up at Zee, squinting at him in the pale light of the spring morning. "Oh, God," she said. "There _was_ a creepy uncle."

"No. No, there wasn't."

"Well there must have been something. You're crying."

He was, he realized. Her hand was brushing them away from his face. Circling her wrists with his hands, he lowered hers. Yes, there had been something. A lot of something, as a matter of fact. More something than he'd expected. He'd known about that day not long before graduation. Chloe had teased him after about his worry that he and Lois were related. And he'd known he'd lost time after he'd re-awoken. After both times. His mother had filled him in on the gaps from the first. He hadn't seen or talked to anyone the first few days after the second, so he hadn't been sure what he'd said or done. Still wasn't sure now that the memories had been restored; his mind was now a jumble of puzzle pieces yet to be assembled.

All but for the part in the caves. He knew how that fit together.

"Clark?" Zee's voice was very soft as she said his name.

He shook his head. "Thank you. This was helpful." It was, even if it felt as if he'd been hit full in chest by Doomsday again. "I need to go."

"Maybe you should talk to J'onn. I'll call him."

"No." J'onn was the last person he needed to see right now. Even if he didn't poke around in Clark's mind he would still know. He always knew things. Never said anything about them, but he knew them. "I don't think so."

He took off directly from the roof, knowing it was a bad idea and not much caring. He needed to leave and he didn't have time to find a spot guaranteed not to have a satellite trained on him.

Where he was going he wasn't sure. He was hovering over Lowell county before he remembered the farm had been sold and the current owners would likely not understand or appreciate why he was hanging around in the loft of their barn. He could go to the Watchtower, but someone would be on duty there and he didn't want to talk to anyone right now, not even to say hello. He didn't want anyone's concern or advice or freshly baked cookies. He wanted to be alone. These days that meant the Fortress, but at the moment he couldn't help but wonder if he was ever really alone there. Jor-El was always present, even if he didn't want to talk. When he did want to talk, he expected Clark to listen.

Tonight, Clark did not want to listen. He'd forgotten about that girl Jor-El had called Kara. Forgotten her name, forgotten what had happened to her. Truthfully, he didn't know what had happened to her. He'd never bothered to find out. He'd forgotten about the way Jor-El had tried to choke his dad, the rope of fire that had come out of the light to wrap itself around his dad's neck. He'd forgotten that Jor-El would have killed him if he hadn't submitted that night in the caves. He didn't want to remember it, but he did. What Jor-El had done, why he'd done it. Jor-El had wanted him to find the stones and assemble them. Had he done so immediately there would have been so much less death on this planet than there had been. Aethyr and Namek would not have landed. Brainiac would not have begun his campaign of destruction. Doomsday would never have been activated. But he couldn't, now, unsee the defiance on his dad's face, nor unhear the calm, inorganic sound of of the computer telling him: "_...as has Jonathan Kent._"

There was no refuge in the Artic for him tonight.

That left him going to and fro along the earth and flying up and down over it. He could stop anywhere, on the peak of Everest, inside the mouth of Mauna Loa, in the middle of Death Valley, but he didn't. Instead he circled in time to the whirl of his mind. He'd remembered the phone call from Zod, the weight of the old handset as it lifted it from the cradle, Zod telling him with Lex's voice, "_Hello, Clark. I heard you wanted to see me_." But he hadn't remembered Chloe. Hadn't remembered searching her out, hadn't remembered telling her he didn't want to leave her there, hadn't remembered her telling him that he had to. Yet he hadn't, until now, questioned what he'd been doing in the basement of the _Planet_ that night in the first place. Maybe it was because he spent more time at thethere these days than he did his apartment, but at that time, what would he have been doing there? She would have been the only reason he would have been in that spot to take that call.

Besides which, she'd kissed him. You would think he would have remembered _that_. You'd think he would have remembered it when he'd met Jimmy. The last time she'd seen him, the last time she thought she might ever see him, she'd kissed him, and then next thing you know she was introducing him to Jimmy like, "Oh hey Clark, Jimmy bought me a candy bar! Isn't he the best?" Why would he have not remembered that? Maybe he had, and he didn't remember not remembering. But if he had, why hadn't he said something, like, "Who are you and what have you done to Chloe?" It wasn't as if –

He pulled up. This was pointless, and unworthy of him. Jimmy had been a friend. Jimmy had died trying to help him, trying to protect Chloe from her own mistakes. Dating Jimmy was one of the best decisions she'd ever made. Jimmy had been good to her. Good for her. He'd thought he'd been. Even if Chloe had kissed him on Black Thursday … well, her kissing him certainly put a new light on what had happened the night of the bachelor party. Going into this he'd pictured a scenario involving some red kryptonite, or maybe blue. Maybe both at once. He'd always assumed that Dax-Ur had conceived his son while wearing his blue K bracelet, so he would have guessed for him to have conceived Robbie he would have needed some of the blue stuff as well, and some of the red because even with the wine he could not have possibly been far enough gone to do that to…

That, however, was not what had happened.

It came to him that he'd stopped flying and was simply drifting, floating in the wind. Just another piece of flotsam tossing in the breeze. Outwardly still and calm. At one with nature, whatever that meant. He was unnatural, at least on this planet. Floating on the breeze isn't what people on this planet did, he reminded himself – which reminded him that by just hanging out here, somewhere over … one of the Baltic states, he wasn't sure which one ... there were probably already a couple of dozen photos of him resting in databases around the world by now. Unless he wanted to run the risk of some bored intelligence operator discovering a guy in civvies floating around like only one guy could, he'd have to have Chloe do a search-and-destroy on them, and on the take-off shots, tomorrow.

Except she couldn't. She was still sitting in the Alameda county jail, awaiting charges. Quietly, from the sound of it. Her heartbeat was slow and steady and she wheezed just a little as she breathed. She did that when she slept, he remembered. A hundred miles north of her, Robbie's smaller heart cantered along, as if it were trying to cover the distance between them.

Clark swallowed the noise developing in his throat. He needed to be getting home.

_**Author's note:** Some of the ideas about magic in this chapter were stolen from John Michael Greer at thearchdruidreport on blogspot. Some of the Clark's memories in this chapter were taken from dialogue of the show and are not my work. _


End file.
